Active ingredients, such as drugs or pharmaceuticals, may be prepared in a tablet form to allow for accurate and consistent dosing. However, this form of preparing and dispensing medications has many disadvantages including that a large proportion of adjuvants that must be added to obtain a size able to be handled, that a larger medication form requires additional storage space, and that dispensing includes counting the tablets which has a tendency for inaccuracy. In addition, many persons, estimated to be as much as 28% of the population, have difficulty swallowing tablets. While tablets may be broken into smaller pieces or even crushed as a means of overcoming swallowing difficulties, this is not a suitable solution for many tablet or pill forms. For example, crushing or destroying the tablet or pill form to facilitate ingestion, alone or in admixture with food, may also destroy the controlled release properties.
As an alternative to tablets and pills, films may be used to carry active ingredients such as drugs, pharmaceuticals, and the like. However, historically films and the process of making drug delivery systems therefrom have suffered from a number of unfavorable characteristics that have not allowed them to be used in practice.
Films that incorporate a pharmaceutically active ingredient are disclosed in expired U.S. Pat. No. 4,136,145 to Fuchs, et al. (“Fuchs”). These films may be formed into a sheet, dried and then cut into individual doses. The Fuchs disclosure alleges the fabrication of a uniform film, which includes the combination of water-soluble polymers, surfactants, flavors, sweeteners, plasticizers and drugs. These allegedly flexible films are disclosed as being useful for oral, topical or enteral use. Examples of specific uses disclosed by Fuchs include application of the films to mucosal membrane areas of the body, including the mouth, rectal, vaginal, nasal and ear areas.
Examination of films made in accordance with the process disclosed in Fuchs, however, reveals that such films suffer from the aggregation or conglomeration of particles, i.e., self-aggregation, making them inherently non-uniform. This result can be attributed to Fuchs' process parameters, which although not disclosed likely include the use of relatively long drying times, thereby facilitating intermolecular attractive forces, convection forces, air flow and the like to form such agglomeration.
The formation of agglomerates randomly distributes the film components and any active present as well. When large dosages are involved, a small change in the dimensions of the film would lead to a large difference in the amount of active per film. If such films were to include low dosages of active, it is possible that portions of the film may be substantially devoid of any active. Since sheets of film are usually cut into unit doses, certain doses may therefore be devoid of or contain an insufficient amount of active for the recommended treatment. Failure to achieve a high degree of accuracy with respect to the amount of active ingredient in the cut film can be harmful to the patient. For this reason, dosage forms formed by processes such as Fuchs, would not likely meet the stringent standards of governmental or regulatory agencies, such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”), relating to the variation of active in dosage forms. Currently, as required by various world regulatory authorities, dosage forms may not vary more than 10% in the amount of active present. When applied to dosage units based on films, this virtually mandates that uniformity in the film be present.
The problems of self-aggregation leading to non-uniformity of a film were addressed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,849,246 to Schmidt (“Schmidt”). Schmidt specifically pointed out that the methods disclosed by Fuchs did not provide a uniform film and recognized that that the creation of a non-uniform film necessarily prevents accurate dosing, which as discussed above is especially important in the pharmaceutical area. Schmidt abandoned the idea that a mono-layer film, such as described by Fuchs, may provide an accurate dosage form and instead attempted to solve this problem by forming a multi-layered film. Moreover, his process is a multi-step process that adds expense and complexity and is not practical for commercial use.
Other U.S. Patents directly addressed the problems of particle self-aggregation and non-uniformity inherent in conventional film forming techniques. In one attempt to overcome non-uniformity, U.S. Pat. No. 5,629,003 to Horstmann et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 5,948,430 to Zerbe et al. incorporated additional ingredients, i.e. gel formers and polyhydric alcohols respectively, to increase the viscosity of the film prior to drying in an effort to reduce aggregation of the components in the film. These methods have the disadvantage of requiring additional components, which translates to additional cost and manufacturing steps. Furthermore, both methods employ the use the conventional time-consuming drying methods such as a high-temperature air-bath using a drying oven, drying tunnel, vacuum drier, or other such drying equipment. The long length of drying time aids in promoting the aggregation of the active and other adjuvant, notwithstanding the use of viscosity modifiers. Such processes also run the risk of exposing the active, i.e., a drug, or vitamin C, or other components to prolonged exposure to moisture and elevated temperatures, which may render it ineffective or even harmful.
In addition to the concerns associated with degradation of an active during extended exposure to moisture, the conventional drying methods themselves are unable to provide uniform films. The length of heat exposure during conventional processing, often referred to as the “heat history”, and the manner in which such heat is applied, have a direct effect on the formation and morphology of the resultant film product. Uniformity is particularly difficult to achieve via conventional drying methods where a relatively thicker film, which is well-suited for the incorporation of a drug active, is desired. Thicker uniform films are more difficult to achieve because the surfaces of the film and the inner portions of the film do not experience the same external conditions simultaneously during drying. Thus, observation of relatively thick films made from such conventional processing shows a non-uniform structure caused by convection and intermolecular forces and requires greater than 10% moisture to remain flexible. The amount of free moisture can often interfere over time with the drug leading to potency issues and therefore inconsistency in the final product.
Conventional drying methods generally include the use of forced hot air using a drying oven, drying tunnel, and the like. The difficulty in achieving a uniform film is directly related to the rheological properties and the process of water evaporation in the film-forming composition. When the surface of an aqueous polymer solution is contacted with a high temperature air current, such as a film-forming composition passing through a hot air oven, the surface water is immediately evaporated forming a polymer film or skin on the surface. This seals the remainder of the aqueous film-forming composition beneath the surface, forming a barrier through which the remaining water must force itself as it is evaporated in order to achieve a dried film. As the temperature outside the film continues to increase, water vapor pressure builds up under the surface of the film, stretching the surface of the film, and ultimately ripping the film surface open allowing the water vapor to escape. As soon as the water vapor has escaped, the polymer film surface reforms, and this process is repeated, until the film is completely dried. The result of the repeated destruction and reformation of the film surface is observed as a “ripple effect” which produces an uneven, and therefore non-uniform film. Frequently, depending on the polymer, a surface will seal so tightly that the remaining water is difficult to remove, leading to very long drying times, higher temperatures, and higher energy costs.
Other factors, such as mixing techniques, also play a role in the manufacture of a pharmaceutical film suitable for commercialization and regulatory approval. Air can be trapped in the composition during the mixing process or later during the film making process, which can leave voids in the film product as the moisture evaporates during the drying stage. The film frequently collapse around the voids resulting in an uneven film surface and therefore, non-uniformity of the final film product. Uniformity is still affected even if the voids in the film caused by air bubbles do not collapse. This situation also provides a non-uniform film in that the spaces, which are not uniformly distributed, are occupying area that would otherwise be occupied by the film composition. None of the above-mentioned patents either addresses or proposes a solution to the problems caused by air that has been introduced to the film.
Therefore, there is a need for methods and compositions for film products, which use a minimal number of materials or components, and which provide a substantially non-self-aggregating uniform heterogeneity throughout the area of the films. Desirably, such films are produced through a selection of a polymer or combination of polymers that will provide a desired viscosity, a film-forming process such as reverse roll coating, and a controlled, and desirably rapid, drying process which serves to maintain the uniform distribution of non-self-aggregated components without the necessary addition of gel formers or polyhydric alcohols and the like which appear to be required in the products and for the processes of prior patents, such as the aforementioned Horstmann and Zerbe patents. Desirably, the films will also incorporate compositions and methods of manufacture that substantially reduce or eliminate air in the film, thereby promoting uniformity in the final film product.